PORTLAND, Ore. — The American Rental Association's northwest and intermountain regions enjoyed decent if unspectacular turnouts for their recent regional rental conferences. Conference organizers in Portland, Ore., where ARA's Region 8 held its Northwest Rental Conference, said attendance was higher than the last two years, showing an upward trend since regional participants resumed the annual fall conferences, which had been discontinued nationally because of exhibitor dissatisfaction.

The two-day conference, held at the Portland Airport Holiday Inn, featured two days of exhibits, a vendor appreciation dinner and a cruise on the Williamette River. Speakers included John Mitchell, a U.S. Bank economist, who analyzed the region's economy; RER editor Michael Roth, who spoke on future trends in the rental industry; ARA president Tom Fouts; and Craig Weiss from ARA Rental U.

Region 8 participants presented its vendor of the year award to Neil Edmonds of Essex Silver-Line West, Vancouver, Wash.; and presented its rental person of the year award to Dean Eklund of Lew Rents, Olympia, Wash. Eklund was credited with playing a major role in the revitalization of the regional conferences in the Northwest.

About 100 people attended the Intermountain Conference of Rental Dealers at the Tamarron Conference Center in Durango, Colo. The event was organized by ARA's Colorado branch, led by chapter president Gary Birkholz of Chatfield Time Rental & Sales, Littleton, Colo., and Herb White of Continental Divide Marketing, Golden, Colo.

“We want to revitalize the old ARA Region 7 and give a strengthened hand to all the independent rental dealers in that region,” Birkholz said. “We feel that we achieved a good degree of success in that regard because we had representatives from rental centers operating in Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico and Utah, plus a store from Chicago.”

Birkholz said that next year's conference will be held in Santa Fe, N.M., in late September or early October and that the region's board of directors is still welcoming suggestions from members regarding where to hold future conferences.